Summary:After keeping Riri Williams prisoner for a week so she can work on her power damping harness, the item is at last complete. But Riri has a suprise she's also been working on to aid her escape. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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It's been over a week since Riri was captured…a week where she hasn't had a lot of freedom to do much more than go to the bathroom in terms of leaving the old underground workshop she's been imprisoned in. Luckily, the plumbing still mostly works, though you probably shouldn't drink the water from the tap.
Her captor hasn't been cruel…she's provided food and water. More, really, she ripped open some vending machines and stole everythign in them to stock the place, so it's water, Monster energy drink, a variety of colas, and then a lot of chips, candy, poptarts, and rice krispie treats, as well as cheap prepackaged strudel and cupcakes. Not exactly the breakfast of champions, but there are a few granola and protein bars tossed in there as well.
More importantly, Whitestar has not really slept. At all. She's kept the door blockaded so Riri can't easily or quickly get back out. She's gotten increasingly twitchy as a result. And she's suddenly asked Riri for a secondary, smaller project. A tracker that can trace solar energy signatures, like her own.
She's sitting in a dusty old chair with a straight back, her hands on the arms of the chair, murmuring to herself quietly in an alien language from time to time.
Soldering's kind of hard when you have the caffeine jitters. Which Riri definitely has. Sure, she doesn't have an electromagnet in her chest, but being kidnapped to build something in a cave (Basements are totally caves) with a box of scraps still sucks. Fortunately, the second request had given her more opportunities to work on her own personal escape plan, and working on her smartwatch was a lot less noticable.
Last connection made, the final case screw closed, Riri flops back into the office chair and checks her watch. …Huh. Her friends are probably all freaking out. Hopefully Aisha told them… Later. It's time. "Hey, it's ready." The teen grunts, lifting up the bulky harness that seems designed to wrap around someone's torso, the energy storage arrays sitting in the front and back.
Whitestar twitches slightly, raising her head, those fey blue eyes focusing on you. "…it's ready?" she says in a slightly raspy voice, pushing herself out of her chair and walking over towards Riri, then reaching out to take the harness. She's been watching the younger girl work…she's not the genius Riri is for design, but she's competent as an engineer, enough she can follow what he's doing. Probably enough to fix it and keep it working once it's built. And to watch for any obvious boobytraps.
"It's ready…." she whispers, running her fingers over it, then sets it aside for a moment, tugging at the alien straitjacket she's been forced to wear…mostly because nothing else can survive her energy pulses. She eyes the harness, as if pondering if she can just strip down and wear only that…at least it's clean. But…
"Bring me the bag in the corner, there." she says, pointing.
Riri scoots away from Whitestar, one of the wheels on her chair squeaking as she does so. …Honestly she's still pretty intimidated. "I'm getting it." She slowly stands up, keeping her hands where Whitestar can see them, and fetches the bag. It gets a gentle toss from about fifteen feet away to the Tamaranean, before Riri retreats again.
Whitestar doesn't seem to pay attention…because she's unclipping, laborously, the straitjacket she wears, clip by clip, hook by hook, then pausing as she frowns, reaching behind her, trying to get to a control on her back, then hissing in annoyance, before she finally catches hold if it. There's a soft humm and the garment seems to loosen, before she steps out of it, letting it fall in a pool on the floor as she pads towards the bag.
She doesn't wear anything under it.
The bag, it turns out, has what look like patched but clean clothes…probably from a thrift shop or Salvation Army dropoff point, that she starts pulling on. A loose t-shirt in black, a pair of faded jeans with the cuffs fraying. No underclothes, but at least they're clean.
…Well this is incredibly awkward. Riri spins around, staring intently at the wall. Somehow, this is more awkward than ebing kidnapped in the first place. "Just… Tell me when you're done." She heads over to the food pile, and acquires a bottle of water and a couple of rice krispie treats. mmmm. Calories.
Whitestar glances over, blinking at Riri's reaction, then purses her lips. "Humans are so…easily embarrassed." she notes, pulling on a pair of high boots, then walking over to the harness again.
Almost reverently, she picks it up, then slides it into place, closing the latches as seh adjusts it. "And the tracker? You have finished this as well?"
"I'll show you that next. Fire it up." Riri gestures towards the central display. "Just tap it there." When Whitestar does so, the devices lights up with a soft hum and a rising whine. "It's calibrating to your energy levels."
Whitestar frowns a bit at that, then looks down at the harness, the desire for having what she needs to find her prey at last warring with the need to have control over her body again. She reaches up, her fingertips running over the softly glowing white sun in the middle of her chestplate, then lets out a sigh, tension leaving her body as the brightly glowing gem in her forehead starts to dim slightly as the machine works, her eyes closing for a moment as she feels the excess power being pulled out of her and into the harness' batteries.
Riri waits to speak again until the gem is pretty much totally dark. "It's taking you all the way down. Establishing a baseline." Reaching down with her left hand, she grabs her smartwatch and pulls. The device extends around to sit on her palm, forming a skeletal fingerless glove. "I said I'd keep you from exploding. But I'm not going to help you hurt anyone. I'm going to leave now." She holds her hand up, aiming her palm and the now blank screen at her kidnapper.
Whitestar mmms? Then opens her eyes, refocusing on Riri. And the palm pointed at her as she turns, sharply, lunging towards her!
Riri flexes her fingers in a particular way, doing her best to keep her arm steady as her glove lets out a bass *thoomp*, sending an almost visible sonic pulse towards Whitestar. HOpefully, strong enough to knock her off her feet, or stun her. She makes for the door, FIring another pulse to knock the couch away from the door.
The unstable Tamaranean is caught by the blast about a foot short of the young engineer, her body hurled backwards as she goes crashing through the weakened opposite wall, moldy concrete shattering around her as part of the wall falls in. The desk is easily knocked aside as well, clearing the door of its barricade!
…Huh. Well that worked significantly better than expected. Riri grins down at her hand, before unlocking the door and sprinting outside. Now she just has to find a working payphone SOMEWHERE in New York… Thankfully, Stark Industries has a 1-800 number.
There's a definite angry growl from the direction of the shattered wall as Whitestar picks herself up, shaking off the broken concrete, then stepping out of the hole, dust clinging to her recently mostly clean clothes that are now a bit ripped from going through a solid wall. The gleaming sun LED on her chest glows brighter as the harness adjusts to her energy signature, before she shoves a piece of rubble out of the way, stalking back into the room as she sees the door.
And the absence of a certain engineer. And a supposed tracker.
Whitestar growls, grabbing the knocked over desk and hurling it into another wall with a crash, then takes a deep breath. She's got a control harness. She can go outside now. She can't track her prey yet.
But she will find a way…